Tag: Students Against Destructive Decisions

Stafford SADD Members Underwrite Christ the King DARE Program Expenses

        The Stafford Technical Center SADD Chapter was advised by Bill Lucci, a parent of a Christ the King student and Assistant Director-Adult Technical Education at Stafford Technical Center that the Christ the King DARE (Drug Abuse Resistance Education) Program at Christ the King School was in need of funds to pay for the expenses for running the program. The Rutland City Police Department has agreed to provide the services of the DARE Instructor, Officer Keith Lorman, who has undergone specific training to provide the DARE core curriculum to fifth or sixth graders. Unfortunately, due to budget cuts and a generally poor economic environment, the funds pay for the program’s expenses were not there. Mr. Lucci told the SADD members about the plight of Mrs. Barbagallo’s fifth grade class, and they unanimously voted to donate the funds ($200) to run the programs.

    SADD (Students Against Destructive Decisions) is a peer leadership program designed to make students role models of responsible behaviors and to act to reduce negative behaviors, such as drug usage. The students saw the opportunities to help the younger students in this case as a perfect example of the type of positive activities that they should be promoting. Normally, the SADD Chapter never has any additional funds, but the chapter just won $1200 as national finalists in a contest involving distracted driving that was run through ActOutLoud.org. The SADD members have chosen to deal with the issue of eating while driving in this contest and their project will be promoted on that site and there will be voting through that site from May 10-21, for the winners, who will get $10,000.

   The Stafford Technical Center SADD Chapter is made up of Mill River Union High School students Kayla Jones, Nate Hance, James Reed, Cantlin Eaton, Cierra Phelps, Erika Stocker, and Haley Cotrupi, Rutland High School students Ashley Barnes, Chris Crout, Jamie Bonilla and Jordan Grenier, West Rutland High School student Kayla Stewart, Proctor High School student Kyle Lenher, and Otter Valley Union High School students Joanna Lilly and Geoffry McDonald.

Two Stafford Students Win Governor’s Award for Community Service

Two Stafford Technical Center students, Erika Stocker of Wallingford, and Ashley Barnes of Rutland, recently won the Governor’s Award for Community Service in the youth division. Both girls are seniors in the Public Safety Services Program and are members of the Students Against Destructive Decisions Chapter at Stafford Technical Center. The awards are granted through the Vermont Commission on National and Community Service, a bipartisan committee of 15 persons appointed by the governor. Both Ashley and Erika have also been nominated for the Presidential Volunteer Service Award at the gold level.

 Ashley Barnes has been an active member of the Rutland City Police Cadets and has done hundreds of hours of assisting  with traffic and crowd control, parades, training and other events over a 2 and a half year period.  Ashley has assisted Detective Ray LaMoria of the Rutland City Police in teaching the RAD (Rape Aggression Defense) Program to all sorts of people, from elementary school students, to high school students, to college students, and to special populations. Ashley plans on becoming a trainer in this program.

Both Ashley and Erika are both active members of the Stafford Technical Center SADD Chapter, and have donated hundreds of hours in training, and in projects designed to reduce the incidence of underage drinking, promote positive personal behaviors, provide positive role models, and to reduce other negative behaviors such as drug usage, dating violence, bullying, etc. They have presented on topics such as “Improper Cell Phone Use”, “Sexting”, and “Teen Dating Violence” at a number of schools and the state-wide Governor’s Youth Leadership Conference. They have been part of a number of highway safety projects, including the “Slow Down, Stick Around” Program which partnered community members and area libraries in an attempt to increase awareness of the dangers of speeding in cars.

Erika has been a very involved member of the Wallingford Fire Department, where she has done every task possible for a junior firefighter for the last five years. She has reported to car crashes, fire scenes, fundraisers, community benefit programs, and training. Her dedication is such that she has on more than one occasion been at a fire scene so late into the night that she came directly to school from the fire scene.

Public Safety Services Students Provide Teen Dating Violence Prevention Program

   The Public Safety Services Program’s first year students provided their peers, as well as the faculty and staff of Stafford Technical Center, with a presentation into the issue of teen dating violence. Regrettably, this issue is far more common than people know, with about 40% of teen girls knowing a peer who either is or has been in an abusive relationship. Abuse can take many forms, from verbal to emotional to social isolation, and physical abuse. Murder is the ultimate form of physical abuse. Women and teen girls are more likely to be murdered by their spouses, lovers, or boyfriends than by strangers by a 2 to 1 ratio.

  Often, young females in our society are not taught about the dangers of dating violence, so the presentation included the warning signs that someone might be in an abusive relationship, how to break up with an abuser safely, how to get help if you are in an abusive relationship, and the patterns of behaviors that abusers go through. While the presentation dealt primarily with male abusers and female victims, which is the case 85% of the time, some males are abused by female partners and some homosexuals of both sexes are abused by their partners as well.

  The students, who are also members of Stafford Technical Center’s SADD (Students Against Destructive Decisions) Chapter, also included some public service announcement, which heightened the effectiveness of their presentation. The audience consisted of all the Stafford Technical Center students who were not on an internship co-op that day, Stafford faculty and staff members. The number was estimated at around 250 people. The students highlighted the efforts of the State of Rhode Island, which passed the Lindsay Ann Burke Act, which mandated that all R.I. students in grades 7-12 get training about domestic violence as part of their school’s curriculum.

   The presenters included Geoffry McDonald, a senior at Otter Valley Union High School, who was the Project Director for this program, Rutland High School seniors James Bonilla, Christopher Crout, and Jordan Grenier, Proctor High School junior Kyle Lenher, Kayla Stewart, a junior at West Rutland High School, and juniors Cierra Phelps, James Reed, and Haley Cotrupi from Mill River Union High School. It was a very powerful presentation.  The Public Safety Services Group is available to present this information to other schools.

Stafford VTLSP Members Assist at Statewide Traffic Enforcement Summit

Vermont recently had a two day Traffic Enforcement Summit which was held at the Lake Morey Inn in Fairlee, Vermont. The purpose of the summit was to bring together the top people in the state to look at the state of highway crashes in Vermont and to develop strategies designed to reduce traffic crashes in the future. The first day was designed to provide attendees with the latest information and trends- resources available, effective motorcycle enforcement, police leadership, improving prosecution of motor vehicle and traffic criminal cases, and advances in impaired driving enforcement, among other topics.

  The second day was designed to put together the best minds in Vermont in the areas of traffic safety and traffic related crime, and to have them develop plans for the next five years and beyond. They were broken down into five groups and tasked with coming up with answers to the following three questions:

  What do you want crash reduction to look like in the next five years?

  How can we identify, coach, support and develop the next generation of highway safety enforcement leadership?

  How can we encourage and support the enforcement community to value crash reduction enforcement as an effective tool to reach their own goals?

  The breakout sessions were led by a professional facilitator, and the responses of the people in the groups were written down by student scribes. The people who designed this conference, who are from the Governor’s Highway Safety Program, asked the Stafford Technical Center’s Vermont Teen Leadership Safety Program members to act as scribes, and record the responses, which will form the basis for the state’s future traffic safety efforts. They chose VTLSP students because the mission of that group, which is aligned in Vermont with SADD (Students Against Destructive Decisions), addresses these traffic safety issues. While six Stafford VTLSP members originally signed up to be scribes at the conference, only two were actually able to go, as others were sick or had unforeseen transportation issues. They were Kayla Jones, senior from Mill River Union High School, and Kayla Stewart, a junior from West Rutland High School. Four VTLSP members from Blue Mountain Union High School, which is much closer to Fairlee, were able to assist with the scribing duties. Four all six students, but especially for the Stafford students, this represented a significant contribution of time and effort to the residents of the state of Vermont.

SADD Chapter wins Two Awards

     Recently, the Stafford Technical Center SADD (Students Against Destructive Decisions) Chapter was recognized with two awards, one from the Vermont State SADD Organization, and one from the national SADD organization. The first award, was given to the chapter at the Vermont SADD spring meeting, recognized the Stafford Chapter’s collaboration with three local SADD chapters from Proctor High School, Fair Haven Union High School, and black River High School, as well as the partnership with Rutland County START, a law enforcement collaborative aimed at reducing underage drinking, and Rutland Area Prevention Coalition, the county’s community anti-drug coalition.

Stafford’s chapter was also lauded for the variety of programs that it has undertaken which are designed to promote healthy lifestyles and responsible highway usage, as well as those designed to reduce destructive behaviors among teens such as underage drinking and drugging, and dangerous internet use. The chapter’s efforts to make the community aware of their actions were also noted.

   The June issue of the SADDvocate, the national SADD monthly newsletter, has chosen the Stafford Chapter as this month’s spotlight chapter. There are about 10,000 SADD chapters in the United States, so to be chosen to be a chapter worthy of being a model for other chapters is quite an honor. The national magazine highlighted a variety of the chapter’s programs designed to positively impact the community, and the fact that this chapter was the recipient of a 2009 Vermont Governor’s Award for Outstanding Community Service.

   The Stafford Technical Center SADD Chapter has been in existence for four years. The 2008-2009 members are: Kayla Jones, Cantlin Eaton, Erika Stocker, Angelica Towsley, and Nate Hance from Mill River Union High School, Vicky Stone, Cody Hesse, Cody Taylor, and Justin Cram from Otter Valley Union High School, Ashley Barnes, Ashley Haas, and Dan Ball from Rutland High School, Joanna Lilly from Poultney High School, and Jon Schaff from Fair Haven Union High School.

 

 

 

 

Stafford SAAD Chapter wins Governor’s Award

The Students Against Destructive Decisions (SADD) Chapter at Stafford Technical Center in Rutland, VT was awarded with a 2009 Vermont Governor’s Award for Outstanding Community Service. The award ceremony occurred on April 25th, in Montpelier, Vermont. SADD members Angelica Towsley and Cody Hesse, both of who received individual awards, accepted the chapter’s award from the governor.

   The Stafford Technical Center SADD Chapter was recognized for four years of outstanding community service. The chapter has done community service activities in three areas: alcohol, tobacco, and other drug awareness and prevention programs, highway safety programs, and other activities that promote healthy lifestyles or reduce other negative behaviors.

   This chapter has initiated or adopted a number of alcohol awareness programs. The SADD Chapter has pioneered the “Tuxedo Insert Program” in collaboration with Rutland County law enforcement officials and community anti-drug coalitions. This program places an informative card into the pocket of every tuxedo and the box of every corsage in that goes out for prom season. The card demonstrates the difference between having a prom night with and without alcohol. This program won an OJJDP “Success Story”. We have done fatal vision goggle demos and other alcohol awareness programs at car shows, “National Night Out”, teen dances, sporting events, a prom fashion show, health and wellness fairs, community and mall health and safety days, etc. SADD hosts the annual “Southern Vermont Red Ribbon Tree” at our local mall to memorialize the victims of drunk or drugged drivers. Rutland County is involved in a program called START (Stop Teen Alcohol Risk Team) which is designed to reduce underage drinking through education and enforcement; the SADD Chapter hosts the annual planning luncheon, over 50 people attend it. Sticker Shock, a program designed to dissuade people from purchasing beer and alcopops for minors, has also been done in collaboration with two other local SADD Chapters.

  Highway Safety programs that this chapter have undertaken include safety belt surveys in the fall and spring, car safety seat installation clinics, signage for safety belt usage, and the “Slow Down, Stick Around” project, where ribbons bearing this message, with cards highlighting the speed-related toll , are placed in libraries, book sellers and car repair shops. The members are also starting the “Save Our Students” Project which involves students signing a pledge to be responsible highway users (safety belts, no distracted driving due to texting, cell phone use or passengers, and driving at appropriate speeds); one of the participants will win a prize, this year a complete kayak outfit, provided generously through a local sporting goods store.

  The chapter also participates in a number of projects which are designed to reinforce other healthy lifestyles. They host an annual SADD Car Show, which recognizes the time and talent that some students have put into their vehicles. The chapter has become a “certifying organization” through the President’s Commission on Volunteer Service; they will be making awards to over a dozen community-minded members of Stafford Technical Center’s student body. The members are certified as peer instructors in internet safety through the I-SAFE organization. They have also developed a program about inappropriate cell phone usage which was presented to the Stafford Technical Center student body at all all-school assembly; this program was repeated  for all students in grades 7-12 in West Rutland.

  This year’s SADD Chapter members are: Angelica Towsley, Cody Hesse, Cody Taylor, Ashley Haas, Vicky Stone, Kayla Jones, Ashley Barnes, Cantlin Eaton, Dan Ball, Jon Schaff, Justin Cram, Joanna Lilly, and Erika Stocker. The chapter will be sending 4 members to the annual SADD National Conference, along with their advisor, John D’Esposito.

 

Exemplary service on the scene and in the classroom

 By Cristina Kumka STAFF WRITER – Published: April 27, 2009

 

Two area teens are used to putting out fires, but they’re not used to getting awards for it.

Gov. James Douglas changed that by recognizing Danby’s Angelica Towsley and Pittsford’s Cody Hesse as two of this year’s outstanding community servants for their work as firefighters and members of an award-winning, national substance-abuse and prevention program.

Towsley and Hesse, both students in Stafford Technical Center’s Public Safety Services Program, have been battling blazes for more than a year while gaining numerous college credits for other types of outreach – ensuring drivers are buckled up and child seats are safely installed.

Towsley, 17, and Hesse, 18, accompanied their parents to Montpelier and received their 2009 Outstanding Volunteer Community Service Awards – two of 92 recipients this year.

“The awards are given to individuals, groups and businesses that best exemplify the spirit of volunteerism,” said Emily Wilson of the Vermont Commission on National and Community Service.

Instructor John D’Esposito called his public safety students the epitome of what going “above and beyond” is all about.

“They spent hundreds of hours of their own time in freezing cold weather, at night in the dark, in hazardous situations, and have continued on as successful students … their whole life is about serving others,” D’Esposito said.

“If you asked yourself who would you want your neighbor to be, these kids would be it and it doesn’t matter that they’re 17 and 18.”

In a classroom last week, Towsley and Hesse posed with a card made by members of their group Students Against Destructive Decisions that’s placed in the pockets of tuxedos owned by many formal shops in Rutland County during prom season, according to D’Esposito.

The card lists the costs of individual prom necessities, from a limo ride to a dress, and the coordinating tab for what it would cost if the students got caught driving drunk decked out in their prom night best.

The creation has inspired a national model, D’Esposito said.

Towsley, a National Honor Society student and East Dorset volunteer firefighter who takes classes at Mill River Union High School and Stafford, said the highlight of her community service over the years wasn’t just one project, for her, it was going back and forth between them.

“I came from a fire and immediately after, changed into my dress for the Honor Society induction,” said Towsley, who has completed 22 college credits before graduating high school while holding a steady job.

“(Volunteerism) gets you out in the community,” she said. “It keeps you out of trouble and gives you things to do.”

For Hesse, the past two years have been filled with nothing less than something to do.

While making his way through the Vermont Police Academy as a junior cadet, Hesse maintained an active membership with the Pittsford Fire Department and put hundreds of hours of work into rebuilding the Pittsford Food Shelf for his Eagle Scout project.

He built shelves for the food shelf and stocked them.

He learned how to battle blazes and fundraise to keep the department up and running.

Hesse, who plans to be a police officer, said he welcomed the award for a simple reason.

“Just the fact that I’m being recognized for what I’ve done for the community,” he said.

Towsley’s and Hesse’s selfless contributions to their communities signifies a statewide trend — according to a recent report, Vermont ranks high on the list of American states with the biggest population of 16- to 18-year olds volunteering in recent years.

Roughly 46 percent of Vermonters in those two age groups volunteered in 2006 and 2007, according to U.S. Census Bureau information and a survey conducted by Tufts University.

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SADD Student selected for national advocacy training

STAFFORD TECHNICAL CENTER SADD STUDENT

SELECTED FOR NATIONAL ADVOCACY TRAINING

 

 

Rutland, VT –Vicky Stone from Stafford Technical Center has been selected to participate in SADD SPEAKs (Students for Policy, Education, Advocacy and Knowledge), a two-day youth advocacy training held prior to the 2009 SADD National Conference in Washington, D.C. this July. SADD (Students Against Destructive Decisions) has embarked on an aggressive legislative advocacy effort to ensure that future federal traffic safety legislation includes a focus on traffic safety components for youth, including resources, programming, and financial support.

   Vicky Stone was one of only 21 students nationwide selected to participate in this prestigious program. SADD SPEAKs students will provide a youth perspective on proposed legislation, educate fellow National Conference attendees, and be an integral part of SADD’s Capitol Hill rally. They will be legislative ambassadors for SADD and the broader youth traffic safety movement as they conduct personal visits with their congressional representatives about vital heath and safety issues.

 

“SADD students can be powerful and persuasive voices in the legislative process Vicky was selected based upon her involvement in local school and community issues and dedication to SADD activities and a substance-free lifestyle,” said SADD Executive Director Penny Wells. “Being chosen to participate in SADD SPEAKs is a great honor and provides an opportunity to represent students in SADD chapters across the country which is dedicated to changing their lives and the lives of their peers.”

 

  Vicky will participate in SADD SPEAKs training July 10 – 12 and the SADD National Conference July 12 – 15. She will take the skills learned back to her chapter and state after the conference and put them to use locally. Through this once-in-a-lifetime experience, this diverse group of young people will gain a remarkable overview of the duties and privileges of each citizen in a democratic society and find out how they can use civic action to bring about positive change for their own and future generations. Vicky is a senior from Pittsford, Vt., who will be graduating from Otter Valley Union High School in June.

  For more than a quarter-century, SADD (Students Against Destructive Decisions) has been committed to empowering young people to lead education and prevention initiatives in their schools and communities. Founded as Students Against Driving Drunk in 1981, SADD has become the nation’s leading peer-to-peer youth education, prevention, and activism organization, with nearly 10,000 chapters in middle schools, high schools, and colleges nationwide. SADD now highlights prevention of many destructive behaviors that are harmful to young people, including underage drinking, substance abuse, risky and impaired driving, and teen violence and suicide. For more information about SADD or the 2009 National Conference, visit sadd.org.